It is the year 2082 and twenty-six-year-old Julian Tomei-Lee lives far from his mother and shares the house only with his father, a great Italian-American entrepreneur, with China increasingly the undisputed leader on the planet. Julian is an exuberant but troubled personality, decidedly reluctant to follow in the footsteps of self-made man of the father; he also loves to travel a lot and often runs away, as far away as possible, on board a futuristic re-edition of the legendary Lancia Delta integral and is attracted in particular by Italy, which in the meantime has been reduced to a mere desert, devastated by climate change and dotted by social tensions, mostly of an interracial nature.
Thus begins the story behind the concept namesake of “Caligvla 2082”, conceived and composed by Giacomo Rivoira, a refined musician from Saluzzo, in the province of Cuneo, and in his free time also a precious signature of this site. A record that is an imaginary short film focused on the future events of a boy constantly searching for his own identity in a world that is now unrecognizable, starting with an Italy that is anything but the beautiful country of the past, prey, as in the past, to new barbaric conquests, in a scenario that at times evokes that adopted by Yoshiyuki Okamura for the famous Ken.
A dystopian world, sure. And of course cyberpunk. But also full of overcrowded metropolitan areas, where unprecedented forms of high such as the neuroxigenica derivative of a digital drug used in the medical field to treat brain tumors or mental illnesses, which works through algorithms by changing the chemical composition of neurons and synapses.
In this scenario sci-fi chaotic and humanly post-apocalyptic, Julian's story emerges and above all the thirteen songs of an album in which Kavinski-style scores, so to speak, crash on the coast between a synth blast and an extraordinary guitar solo.
“Driving”, de facto theopening track of the album, after theintro explanatory of concept narrative, sets the record straight instantly, with a rhythm section that is a bit reminiscent of the more inspired Motor (duo composed of Bryan Black and Olly Grasset), before a supreme and tearful guitar enters the scene, while a small voice daftpunkishcombined with a very bright keyboard, do the rest. It is no coincidence, moreover, that the figure of Caligvla, the stage name of Julian's musical incarnation, was born in a music shop, almost as if to unconsciously wink at the beginnings of the two Frenchmen among the shelves of the Fnac of Paris, in whose rooms the presence of an electric guitar stands out divinely, an instrument considered “buried” in an era marked entirely by the predisposed algorithms.
The notes of “Driving” inaugurate the long one trip by Julian. An odyssey immersed in a surreal future, in which synthwave is the central vector, between vaporous synthesizers, neon that dye the night with a thousand fluorescent colours, and that perennial sensation of speed that lengthens the corners and smooths the shapes of the road. In short, all the imagery of one of the key genres of the new millennium is certainly at the foundations of the world built by Caligvla 2082. But this new analogue world unfolds precisely in a retro-futurist Italy which between redefined geography, new despots, rampant ignorance and the majesty of the classical era now in oblivion, is so rich in unthinkable details as to make it in all respects a surprising musical place.
It is just a coincidence that two ambitious and towering architectures, both suspended between antiquity and the future, such as “Caligvla 2082” and “Megalopolis” by Francis Ford Coppola saw the light in the same months. But it is a fascinating parallel and therefore we mention it. After all, the notes of “Automatic Music” wouldn't look bad behind Adam Driver's big nose as he peers down at a New Rome immersed in a sea of yellow light.
In a first album, approached both as a multi-instrumentalist and as an architect, Rivoira embeds trends in the synthwave world Moroderiansmenacing layers of keyboards wing Carpenter, escapes worthy of “Discovery” (raise your hand if you haven't thought of it even just seeing the purple cover with the guitarist hero from a distant dimension) and, unbelievable, guitar forays worthy of the best Aor anthems.
“Iron In My Veins” immerses the listener in this sort of peplum synthwave, with its growling synths and great beats, chiseling out cybernetic details. However, it is “The Most Useless Lives” that shuffles the cards on the table, immersing a real 80s FM song in this seething computerized scenario. Rivoira alternates the robotic tone of vocoderthe singing and the falsetto, it also adds some streaks of Stratocaster, but above all a chorus to remember. The guitar also steals the show at the end Aor of “Love At First Fight”, in the other song “Beyond The Gravity”, as well as in the final “Caligvla”, where a riff heavy metal enlivens the story of the exploits of the anti-establishment rock star protagonist of the plot cyberpunk of the disc.
Ambition and vision are the two things that together with the right amount of boldness have allowed Caligvla 2082 to make the so-called debut with a bang, a work that if given the right push, could stand alongside the classics of the genre.
01/11/2024
Antonio Santini for SANREMO.FM
